Pope makes first phone call to Vladimir Putin

Elise Ann Allen/ Crux• June 5, 2025

Pope Leo XIV has had his first phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The call on the afternoon of Wednesday, 4 June, comes as tensions between Russia and Ukraine continue to escalate despite international efforts to broker a ceasefire.

The Pope’s phone conversation with Putin, confirmed by a Vatican spokesman late on Wednesday night, came the same day that United States President Donald Trump had a call with the Russian president also.

Wednesday’s conversation between the Pope and Putin marked the first conversation between the two since Leo’s election on 8 May. It follows the new Pope making it clear that resolving the conflict in Ukraine, alongside the one in Gaza, is one of his primary concerns on the global stage.

Pope Leo, who made an appeal for peace in Ukraine during his first public remarks after being elected, held a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky days after his election, and he met privately with Zelensky, who attended his 18 May inaugural Mass, after the ceremony in the afternoon.

In a 4 June statement, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said that during Pope Leo’s call with Putin, the leaders discussed “issues of mutual interest” as well as the situation in Ukraine and related peace efforts.

“The Pope made an appeal to Russia to make a gesture that would promote peace and stressed the importance of dialogue for the establishment of positive contact between parties and for seeking solutions to the conflict,” Bruni said.

He said the humanitarian situation in Ukraine was discussed, with the Pope highlighting the need to provide aid where necessary. Also discussed were the ongoing negotiations for the exchange of prisoners and the importance of the work being done by Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi of Bologna, who was Pope Francis’s personal peace envoy to Ukraine.

After being tapped as peace envoy to Ukraine in 2023, Zuppi made visits that summer to Kyiv, Moscow, Washington, DC, and Beijing; he has continued to engage the various parties involved on issues such as prisoner exchanges, the facilitation of humanitarian aid and the return of Ukrainian children forcibly deported to Russia.

During the call, Pope Leo also referred to the well-wishes he received from Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill at the start of his papacy and expressed gratitude, stressing “how common Christian values can be a light that helps to seek peace, defend life and to seek authentic religious freedom,” Bruni said.

The phone call between the Pope and Putin came the same day that Trump spoke to the Russian president, marking their second conversation in a matter of weeks amid ongoing ceasefire negotiations.

Trump, who announced the call on his social media platform Truth Social, indicated there could be an escalation in hostilities in Ukraine, as Moscow was poised to respond to a recent drone attack by Ukraine that destroyed a swath of Russian war planes, including strategic bombers and various types of combat aircraft.

In his post, Trump said the conversation lasted 75 minutes but that it would not yield an immediate end to the war. He also made no mention of pressuring Russia to agree to an unconditional ceasefire.

“We discussed the attack on Russia’s docked airplanes, by Ukraine, and also various other attacks that have been taking place by both sides,” he said in the post. “It was a good conversation, but not a conversation that will lead to immediate peace.”

He noted that Putin had indicated “very strongly, that he will have to respond to the recent attack on the airfields”.

Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov, in reference to the Trump-Putin call, said Ukraine’s strike on Russian airfields “was also touched upon”, but he did not indicate whether Putin had pledged a response to those attacks.

Ukrainian lawmaker Oleksandr Merezhko, in comments to CNN, voiced concern that Trump was tacitly approving Russian retaliation with his casual description of the conversation, and by the lack of any references to an appeal to stop the violence.

When it comes to the Pope’s efforts, it remains unclear what the “gesture that would promote peace” that the pontiff put to Putin might consist of. It may have been to refrain from retaliation over the most recent attacks by Ukraine, or a willingness to consider an unconditional ceasefire accord.

Photo collage: Pope Leo XIV during the general audience at St Peter’s Square at the Vatican, 4 June 2025 (Photo by TIZIANA FABI/AFP via Getty Images) / Vladimir Putin during a meeting with members of the Russian government via a videoconference at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence, Moscow, Russia, 4 June 2025 (Photo by GAVRIIL GRIGOROV/POOL/AFP via Getty Images).